In various settings, crops or other material may be arranged for pick-up by mechanized equipment. For example, cut material (e.g., hay) in a field may be raked or otherwise arranged into windrows in the field for further processing. Various mechanisms may be utilized to gather such material. For example, a baler (e.g., a round baler) may be pulled by a tractor along a material windrow and may pick up the cut material from the windrow for formation into a bale. Likewise, other equipment may be utilized to pick up and/or rearrange windrow material for various purposes.
Due to various factors, windrows may not be uniformly shaped or oriented. For example, windrows may exhibit varying widths depending on factors including characteristics of the windrow material and of the equipment used for raking or cutting of the material. Similarly, a windrow may not necessarily follow a straight line across a field. Rather, the center of a particular windrow may meander in various ways (e.g., depending on the path of travel of equipment used for raking or cutting). Finally, even for skilled operators or vision systems, it may be difficult to distinguish the boundaries of a windrow from the underlying ground and plant material.